


full moon

by marshie_marshmallow



Category: Fire Emblem: Fuukasetsugetsu | Fire Emblem: Three Houses
Genre: Alternate Universe - Vampire, Alternate Universe - Werewolf, Dimilix Week (Fire Emblem), M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-02-16
Updated: 2020-02-16
Packaged: 2021-02-28 06:27:02
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,679
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22749295
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/marshie_marshmallow/pseuds/marshie_marshmallow
Summary: In which Felix got turned by vampires and Dimitri got bit by a werewolf during the past five years.
Relationships: Dimitri Alexandre Blaiddyd/Felix Hugo Fraldarius
Comments: 3
Kudos: 59
Collections: 2020 Dimilix Week





	full moon

**Author's Note:**

> for dimilix week day 3: supernatural/creature au
> 
> this one is something of an experiment in writing style.  
> i had a canon-adjacent vampire/werewolf au rattling around in my head for weeks before i saw the prompt list. so naturally i wrote it

_ “May I ask you something, Felix?” _

_ “Depends on what it is.” _

_ “Will you tell me the full story? Of how you came to be turned, I mean? Rodrigue had said you left home on a hunt and never returned. I assume it has something to do with that.” _

_ “... How  _ **_could_ ** _ I have returned? A Fraldarius? Allowing himself to be turned into one of the blood-sucking monsters we’re supposed to kill? Shameful, to say the least.” _

_ “Will you not tell me, then? I do not wish to pry if you would prefer not to speak of it.” _

_ “Fine, I’ll tell you.” _

* * *

Dimitri never lets Felix watch the transformation. He claims its a grotesque thing and painful, too. He doesn’t want Felix to see him in pain.

Instead, Felix hovers in the trees, waiting for the moon to rise high enough that he can give chase to the wolf-prince. He carries with him a satchel containing a spare set of clothes and the eyepatch. Dimitri will need them for when he turns back in the morning.

He’s the only one that ever accompanies the prince during full moons. He’s the only one strong enough to fight off the wolf that still bears Blaiddyd strength, even though it loses completely its human mind. There’s also the fact that he’s unable to have the infection spread to him, being as it can only spread to humans and Felix hasn’t been human in a while.

* * *

_ “There were attacks on a village in the southern part of the territory. From the reports we got, it had seemed to be a singular vampire. So I went on the hunt. By myself. It was supposed to be an initiation for me. I had just turned twenty-two about a week prior. I  _ **_should_ ** _ have gone on my first solo hunt at twenty-one but the war had complicated things. Regardless, I would make a poor heir to Fraldarius if I couldn’t handle one vampire.” _

_ “So was it that you truly couldn’t handle it or was there more than one?” _

_ “There was more than one,  _ **_obviously_ ** _. About four or five... it was more of a coven than a nest. Still, a large enough group that my father would have sent someone with me, had he known. They ambushed and surrounded me. Were they just humans, it would have been a different story but vampires... It didn’t take much for them to knock me out. When I woke up, it was with my hands tied behind my back and a blindfold over my eyes.” _

_ “Were you scared?” _

_ “ _ **_Hah_ ** _! … I was terrified, to be honest. I was raised my whole life being told stories of the kind of horrors that vampires can inflict on a person… and there I was. Entirely at their mercy.” _

* * *

A howl rings through the woods and Felix gives chase.

If there’s an upside to being a blood-sucker, it’s the speed and agility that it grants him. It’s an ability that, like all the others, is dependent upon how recently he fed on human blood but there’s really no way to escape that part. If he doesn’t feed on humans, his literal thirst for blood will drive him to a mindless rampage.

Dimitri, on the other hand, goes on a rampage every month. There’s no lessening the effects of the moon’s curse but it’s at least something they can plan for. In exchange for locking himself away or running off deep into the woods once a month, he can still live as a fairly ordinary human. After all, everyone knows to lock their doors and stay inside on a full moon, lest they run into a monster.

No, they can deal with Dimitri being a werewolf. It’s something that can be worked around. The  _ real  _ problem is that lycanthropy is hereditary. Any children Dimitri has will inherit his curse and so will their children. There are no other Blaiddyds to carry on the line, instead. The royal family of Faerghus would be, now and forevermore, werewolves.

* * *

_ “They knew I was a Fraldarius. I expected them to drain me and leave my body to be discovered or try to enthrall me but they didn’t. Instead, they forced me to drink  _ **_their_ ** _ blood. I tried to not let them. Tried to fight them off or at least spit it back out. They won in the end, though. I can’t say why they did it. Maybe they found the idea of a Fraldarius vampire funny… or maybe they hoped to force Father to choose between fulfilling his duty as a Fraldarius or protecting his son.” _

_ “Is that part of why you ran away, then? Especially considering you tried to hide when we met with Rodrigue. And, even after that, you avoided him as much as possible.” _

_“I can’t deny it. Coming from the most famous hunter family in Faerghus, if not all of Fodlan, I certainly... I didn’t know how Father would react. There was some primal part of me that was_ _scared that he would be more ready to destroy the creature I had become than take me back into his home as his son again. Another part of me wanted to march right back home and_ ** _make_** _him kill me whether he wanted to or not.”_

_ “And you chose instead to run away, letting everyone think you had been slaughtered by the vampires.” _

_ “When it came down to it, it would be between killing me or betraying what House Fraldarius has always stood for. I never wanted to be  _ **_this_ ** _ but I thought it better to try to simply deal with it myself than force him to make that choice. It wasn’t hard to escape once the turning was complete. The ropes didn’t hold up to vampire strength. Then I left. Wandered wherever my feet would take me and never stayed in one place more than two or three days.” _

* * *

He catches up to the wolf in a clearing of the forest. It’s a massive thing, coming up to his ribs, with golden fur the color of Dimitri’s hair. When it notices his arrival, it turns its one blue eye on him and growls. Felix simply bares his fangs and hisses back at it.

It doesn’t like it when its shows of dominance aren’t met with submission. It lunges at Felix but he throws it off with ease. It turns itself over, growls, barks, and lunges again.

Felix was a fool to ever compare the human to any kind of animal. The wolf is the true savage beast. It attacks any living - or unliving - thing it can smell nearby. It will eat anything it kills. Sometimes it will eat things that were dead when it found them. Any of their human companions would run the risk of being infected or killed by it.

But there’s a very specific list of things that can take down a vampire and ‘a giant dog’s teeth’ is not among them.

* * *

_ “I found out the hard way that animal blood only helps to lengthen the amount of time between preying on humans. It didn’t feed me entirely and I could feel myself slowly growing… thirsty. I needed human blood unless I wanted to wake up one morning and find I had slaughtered some innocent village on a rampage. So... I started feeding off of bandits and Imperial troops. Lived that way up until the day of the millennium festival. Then I did what was objectively one of the most idiotic things I could have done and came here, thus ruining the pretense that I had been killed." _

_ “Did you anticipate any particular reaction to that revelation?” _

_ “I had thought they would be more disgusted with me.” _

_ “Disgusted? Why would they be disgusted?” _

_ “For needing blood to live. For allowing myself to have failed so badly. For desecrating a place like Garreg Mach when the Church itself calls for the destruction of anything that toes the line between life and death too much. For being such a terrible hunter that my first solo hunt ended in such a way.” _

_ "I doubt they ever would have been that disgusted with you. You’re their friend. My friend. If you recall, they all took the discovery of my lycanthropy rather well, too… though I suppose the beast I turn into under full moons paled in comparison at the time to the beast that I was the rest of the month.” _

_ “I guess everyone was too in shock from everything. You were alive and a werewolf. I was alive and a vampire. The professor was just… alive in general. There was a lot to process that day. Something had to give, I suppose.” _

_ “I suppose you may be right.” _

_ “Alright, then. I’ve told you my story. It’s only fair that you tell me yours. How did you get infected?” _

* * *

Wrestling with the overgrown mutt is tiring. Felix knows that it’s in part because he hasn’t fed recently, even though he really should have before the full moon hit.

It’s harder to feed as long as he stays in the monastery. There’s less opportunity to go after his preferred targets and he won’t feed on innocent townspeople. His friends have gone so far as to offer to let him drink from them but he thus far refuses to do so. Once he starts feeding, he finds it nearly impossible to stop until the victim is dead and he’s terrified that he would drain them entirely.

The wolf manages to throw him to the ground with a lunge. It looms over him, growling. Felix regrets not going out and finding some source of blood before this whole ordeal. As he throws the wolf off again, he makes a mental note to remember to always go hunting before full moons, even if it’s inconvenient at the time.

* * *

_ “Ah. I am afraid there’s not nearly as much of a story there, compared to yours. I can’t remember much of it, either. It was a full moon in the middle of the woods. I was careless. The beast took a bite of my leg before I managed to kill it. One solid bite that draws blood is all it takes to spread the infection, after all.” _

_ “And the full moons before we met up at the monastery? What did you do?” _

_ “I am afraid I did not…  _ **_do_ ** _... anything. I was hardly in the best state of mind and it mattered little to me what destruction my transformations wrought. I often did not even realize the full moon had come until it did.” _

_ “And you can’t remember anything that happens when you’re transformed, right?” _

_ “No. I can only look at the trail of destruction left in my wake and try to guess. It… terrifies me, not knowing the kind of damage I wreaked for so long. I have killed countless people these past five years in human form alone. Who knows how many more I killed as the wolf? … I’m a monster.” _

_ “Yeah and so am I. You turn into a rabid animal once a month. I kill people and drain their bodies of blood to continue living. I’m the very thing I was raised to destroy, as ordered to by the doctrine of the Church itself. You’re lucky, compared to me. At least lycanthropy isn’t considered a complete crime against the goddess.  _ **_You’re_ ** _ a person with an awful disease.  _ **_I’m_ ** _ an unholy abomination.” _

_ “It might be a disease but it’s one I didn’t think to control. If a person with an infectious disease doesn’t properly quarantine themselves and they spread it to countless people, as a result, are they not to blame? To have the disease is one thing. To not properly ensure its containment is another.” _

* * *

The wolf stops attacking him. He’s managed to exhaust it, finally.

It wanders off to the edge of the clearing and curls up at the base of a tree. Felix leaves the satchel with Dimitri’s clothes hanging from a branch of the tree before retreating into the shadiest area that he can find nearby. He doesn’t technically need to sleep anymore but he finds that he likes to do so. Especially after fighting with a giant animal for what seems to have been hours.

He buries himself deep within the bushes and pulls his cloak tight around himself, hood over his head. It wouldn’t do to wake up after the sun’s risen and be burned because of it. Even if the sun doesn’t kill him as the folktales say, it’s still incredibly irritating, especially when he hasn’t fed recently.

He curls his legs to his chest to ensure that he’s completely covered and closes his eyes.

* * *

_ “I often wonder if the people in Faerghus would truly accept me as their king if they knew what I have become. Werewolves are still very much reviled, even _ **_if_ ** _ we’re not considered enemies of the goddess. Were I not the last living member of House Blaiddyd, I might be inclined to pass the position on to someone who will not bring the curse of lycanthropy with them.” _

_ “At least you know what you’re dealing with. If you’re careful, you can still go back and have… something of a normal life. I trust you’ll make a good king, even if you and your descendants have to lock yourself up in the dungeons every full moon from now on.” _

_ “And you, Felix? What will you do?” _

_ “Now that people know I wasn’t actually murdered, I’ll have to cede House Fraldarius to my uncle. Officially, that is. Then I’ll leave. I can’t very well stay in Faerghus. It’s a lot harder to hide my condition than yours and no ‘Holy Kingdom’ would accept a vampire within their ranks.” _

_ “I would. Accept you, that is. Though it would indeed be difficult to hide your lack of aging or your… dietary habits, I still wish for you to remain by my side. Being what I am now, it does me good to have someone who I know could slay the beast, should it need to happen.” _

_ “... You’re saying that you would want  _ **_me_ ** _ to be the one to have to put you down.” _

_ “Would you not do it?” _

_ “I would but only because I know you would rather die than run the risks of what could happen in the wolf’s rampage.” _

_ “Rest assured, I pray it will not come to that but… You are the only one I can ask to do it, Felix. Because you’re the only one who can safely go against me in that form, yes... but also because you are my friend. I trust you.” _

_ “Hmph. You’re a sentimental fool, you know?” _

* * *

He wakes up in the early morning to rustling behind him. When he crawls out of the underbrush, he sees Dimitri pulling a shirt over his head. The night is over and they have another month before they have to do this again. He stands up and begins picking leaves out of his hair and clothing.

Dimitri laughs upon seeing Felix’s appearance and crosses the clearing to assist. In return, Felix holds out his hand expectantly. Dimitri drops the eyepatch into it and he reaches up to put it on him. They don’t need to exchange words as they help each other to look just a  _ little _ more presentable before they return to the monastery.

Maybe he and Dimitri  _ are _ both bloodthirsty creatures now, just of different types. And maybe Felix will inevitably outlive Dimitri because werewolves live only as long as humans do, while vampires only die of unnatural causes. In these little snatches of time, though, they can both pretend for a moment that these things are alright. That these facts don’t bother either of them.

There’s an unpleasant reality waiting at the end of this war. One of secrecy and locked rooms on full moons, solo ‘hunting’ trips far from the capital and hiding from the public to avoid scrutiny. It’s nice to be able to forget about it for just a few minutes.

If only these moments could last just a little bit longer.


End file.
